A Lesson
by TMBlue
Summary: Now that the war is over, Ron finally does something he's been meaning to do for far too long: signs up for lessons in 'Hermione.' Written for the lovely urbanmama1.
1. An Assignment

**A Lesson**

_**A/N:** This fic is dedicated to my wonderful friend, **urbanmama1**, who ran a lovely charity/fic exchange on LiveJournal at the end of 2010. I really hope you enjoy it! *hugs* Also, thanks soooo much to my incredible beta-friend, **emmacmf, **who proofed this for me rather last minute so I could finally post it! It's long overdue ;)_

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**Chapter One - An Assignment**

He leaned back, allowing his body to drop freely onto his bed, clutched by the force of gravity. It felt almost too good to know that he could fall and be caught, certain that he'd be alright. Allowing himself a moment of silence as he looked up at his orange slanted ceiling, he held his breath. It was uncanny to imagine that hours previous he had been in control of very little, and now... he was the sole director of his own life.

And then, there it was again, that sort of achy feeling in his chest. He didn't have to be conscious of understanding it to know what it meant in some deep, ingrained way - Hermione was too far out of his sight. He needed her...

He was too tired to move, so he closed his eyes and breathed deeply, hoping she'd find him soon. It occurred to him that she might think he was avoiding her. After all, he had collapsed this morning in a heap on his bed in the boys dormitory after Ginny had arrived, supplying company for Hermione. He hadn't wanted to leave Hermione, and he had hoped she'd find him then too, but she hadn't. When he'd woken up again and descended the stairs, she had smiled and told him it was time to go home. He had had to ask where that was... it had been too long and too much had happened for him to be sure of anything, or to understand the meaning of so many words that used to be so solid and true...

Now, he cracked open his sore eyes and checked his watch for the time - half seven. The sky outside his window was turning rapidly pink, reflecting off the orange of his room and overwhelming him slightly with the intensity of the colour combination. It had been his life before, facing this bright little world every day and night, but after his extended absence and this past year's darkness, it was nearly too much to take.

Hermione. He needed her. Right now.

"Ron?" he heard her say tentatively from outside his closed bedroom door. The girl could read his mind, clearly...

He let out a happy sigh and his lips turned up into a grin as he answered her, though he remained on his back, muscles relaxing more fully into the mattress...

"Yeah, come in."

She turned the doorknob slowly, and the door moved inward to reveal her as the old rusty hinges squeaked.

"Hi," she said shakily as she looked down at him from the doorway.

He moaned his response, unable to form actual words, and he realized immediately just how relieved he sounded now that she was here. He wondered what he looked like to her, head back, staring up into her eyes as she hovered in shadow. She smiled shyly and stepped into his room, closing the door behind her, much to his excitement. So, she was here to stay!

She walked slowly over and sat on the edge of his bed, her back towards him, staring across his room at the window.

"Are you okay?" Ron choked out, eyes on the side of her face where tendrils of unruly hair covered bits of her flushed cheek.

She nodded and turned towards him just enough to give him a view of the edge of her mouth as she looked down at the blanket covering his bed.

"I'm trying really hard not to be nervous," she admitted timidly as she bit her lip.

"Nervous?" Ron asked, propping himself up on his elbow, finding strength somehow in his tentative curiosity.

"You..." she began softly, "you're making me nervous." The corner of her mouth twitched and she bit down harder on her lip.

"I am?" Ron asked, sitting all the way up behind her now.

"Being here with you... I was afraid you might be asleep, but when I called for you and found out you weren't..." She let out a long, shaky breath. "Is it alright that I'm here?"

"Why are you so afraid?" Ron asked softly, totally ignoring her questions. He saw them as unnecessary when all he wanted was her... when it was so totally obvious to him that they belonged together now.

She turned abruptly to look at him, twisted awkwardly to make eye contact. His eyes widened at the sudden change, and he swallowed the happy nerves building in his throat at the sight of her perfect face so close to his own.

"Because now things are so real, aren't they?" she began. "Before, it was so easy to pretend we were just close friends. I can't really just go back to that safety net now, can I..."

"But..." Ron started, a lingering doubt stirring in the pit of his stomach, "you'd want to? Go back there, I mean..."

"No!" she said harshly. "Of course I... but that's my point."

Ron stared at her confused face, wanting to comfort her, just to forget the world and disappear in her arms, what he'd been waiting for all this time...

"Everything is so... so..." Hermione spluttered, as if trying to find the right word without saying something too sharp for her delicate tone... "ruined," she concluded.

Ron swallowed hard again, thinking of Fred... and all the fresh, open wounds he wasn't ready to heal.

"Yeah, a lot of things are really..." He paused, trying to think of another word besides the one that was on the tip of his tongue. But he sighed, unable to bother with the tiresome process of flipping through the dictionary in his own head for something that wasn't a swear word... "fucked right now," he concluded, totally crushing her lovely words with his dirty mouth.

Hearing himself actually say it, he had to hope he hadn't broken some spell by being so... _him_. But then she began to smile, a small tug of her mouth. And the moment he saw that smile reach her eyes, he sighed his silent relief.

"You're alive," he stated obviously. "You're really alive."

She choked back a sob as she nodded.

"You are too," she said as if she could not believe it.

"Then we're not ruined at all," Ron said as he scooted a bit closer to her.

She nodded quickly, as if the mere act would be able to restrain her tears, chaining them inside where she so clearly wanted to keep them. She half-chuckled, half-cried, as she turned back to the window, her cheeks red. Ron felt another wave of exhaustion as he leaned in to her, ignoring all of his familiar warning bells, the lights flashing inside his head telling him he had no right over her, that he had to be careful. Sod it all. He was ready for this. And he sensed that she was too. After all, how much more obvious could she be? She had kissed him and she wasn't taking it back... not yet at least. He was going to enjoy this for as long as it lasted, and he assumed that would simply be as long as she would continue to be blind to all of his imperfections. If she hadn't let them stop her yet, perhaps he'd get in a good few years with her before she started to notice...

He rested his cheek against the back of her head and wrapped an arm around her stomach from behind. He felt her shake and hoped it was from nerves and not tears. He never wanted her to cry again. He knew that it was ridiculous and immature, but he felt no other desire more strongly at the moment than his desperate hope that he could put an end to her sadness for good.

She felt perfect against him, solid and warm and alive. He squeezed tighter and she relaxed back into him. But as his eyes closed, savouring his sense of touch, she pulled out of his embrace...

...only long enough to turn into him and hug him properly, pushing him sideways, down into his bed in the process, their heads landing next to each other on his feather pillow.

He laughed as her arms tightened around him, her face buried against his neck. He'd never been so close to her for so long, moments stretching out as he moved his hands soothingly up and down her back.

"Can I stay here tonight?" she whispered, a nearly silent mumble against the skin just underneath his ear. His body tensed before he shivered.

"Please," he choked out, voice cracking.

But, as he often did, he second guessed her meaning, wondering if she'd simply been asking to stay overnight at the _Burrow_, not necessary here with him... in his bed. But, recalling the last time he'd over analyzed her words, he shoved his insecurities aside. He'd spent far too much time replaying the exact words she'd said, asking him to Slughorn's party in sixth year, to see if she had just been asking him as a friend. And, concluding that she had, with the help of a few unfortunate words from his sister, he'd proceeded to ruin a perfectly good year... well, up until the poisoning bit, at least.

Bloody hell, if he could call being poisoned part of the _good _bit...

"Ron?" Hermione began, pulling up away from his neck finally and looking him in the eye. Her face was so close that he could lean away from his pillow a few inches and kiss her right now.

"Mmm?" was what he opted for instead, eyes glazing over with the intensity of her soft gaze.

Blinking, she withdrew an arm from around him and played with a piece of his hair near his left cheek, studying it much too intently, eyes glued to it. He forgot how to breathe.

"When did everything change?" she asked.

He was caught off guard by her cryptic question and swallowed hard as he tried to unriddle it.

"I don't really remember," she continued. "I don't remember when I realized how much you really meant to me."

He sucked in the tiniest gasp and her eyes darted over to his lips as she bit her own, then up to his eyes as her heartbeat increased, pounding an insistent rhythm against him where her chest was pressed to his side.

"I don't either," he managed to say. "Guess I just always knew, somehow."

She blinked rapidly, eyes watering, and he watched with apprehension to see if tears would fall. But they didn't, and she smiled, blushing. And she lowered her head to his shoulder, getting comfortable on her side, left arm across his torso as she sighed heavily, settling against him. Shaking, he reached up to cover her hand where it rested on his chest, and he heard her sigh this time, a tiny, contented, high-pitched noise escaping with her exhale.

His sore eyes complained, and he shut them. He felt that he could sleep for days, here with her in his arms. The glow of his room, so sharp and irritating moments before, somehow warmed and calmed him now as he blinked his eyes open again, squeezing Hermione tighter against his side. She laughed lightly and snuggled into him, and his heart skipped.

"This'll never work," she whispered, and he turned his head a fraction in her direction.

"What won't?"

"Can't sleep," she admitted, and he could hear a smile in her voice, though he couldn't see it, her face so tightly tucked into his shoulder.

"Don't be nervous," he said, though his body betrayed him by shivering again. She laughed.

"Try telling yourself that."

Instead of speaking, words drifting away from him like he'd never known them, he scooted down a few inches, startling Hermione as he turned into her, forehead against hers as she opened her eyes wide. He grinned as he overlapped her left foot with his right ankle.

"How about now?" he asked, still grinning. "Better? Think you can sleep _now_?"

She burst out laughing, hugging him with her left arm around him, hand clutching his shirt near his shoulder blades.

"Ron, I'm so tired," she complained, grinning too now. "But you're making it impossible..."

His fingers played with the back of her shirt too as he swallowed, stomach fluttering with a chorus of butterflies. She narrowed her eyes in mock seriousness.

"Don't even think about kissing me. I'll be up all night," she said as she blushed.

His lips parted and he stopped breathing again. She was bad for his health, really.

"Thanks," he managed to say. "Now that's _all _I can think about." Their grins faded at the same time, breath coming faster. He knew she was wondering the same thing he was... Was he going to do it?

But she'd told him not to. But she'd _said _it! She'd actually _said _it! _Kissing_! Kissing _her_! She'd been talking about _him_! ..._kissing her!_

The repetition made him dizzy.

And maybe that's why he did it.

Her lips were so soft, he nearly melted. She clutched his shirt tighter and wound her leg further under his. Her bottom lip was between his, so warm and full and wet. He shivered again as his hand moved up her back into her hair. He moved his lips. She moved hers more, parting them against his.

"Hermione..." he mumbled as they parted for the tiniest breath before he crushed her again.

Her arms moved, hands on his cheeks, pushing her chest against his... so many things were happening at once that he could hardly comprehend all of them. And then, he felt her tongue on his lip. And he moaned much too loudly. But she didn't seem to mind in the slightest.

He touched his tongue to hers experimentally, and she moaned to match his from earlier. Oh God, he was making her fall apart. He loved her. He wanted to tell her. He wanted to kiss every bloody inch of her...

...so he started with her cheeks. The right one first - was easier to reach. Her skin was so smooth and flushed and warm. His lips moved up, over, until he found the edge of her hair, just in front of her ear.

"Ron..." she whispered, and he found her eyes still closed when he got to them, eyelashes tickling him as he kissed her eyelids. She gasped and sighed back to back.

Smiling now, he kissed his way down her nose, back to her waiting mouth. Her hand wound so tightly into his hair as their tongues met again that he wouldn't have been surprised to find out that they were stuck like this, together, forever.

Awareness of how far this was going crept up somewhere in the recesses of his mind, but he took note of it as he parted for another breath, opting to rest his forehead against hers as he tried to calm down instead of going in for another kiss, the one he sensed she was waiting for.

"Ron..." she began, and he heard the question in her tone.

"'M fine," he said with a smile, though he closed his eyes so he wouldn't be able to see her, knowing he'd lose the small frayed edges of control that he was clinging onto if he had to look into her concerned eyes this close up.

"Sure?" she asked tentatively.

"Oh, definitely," he said.

But he felt her remaining tension as his hand relaxed against her back. He had to explain, at least a bit.

"Gotta slow down for a second..."

"Oh," she sighed. "Sorry."

He shook his head against hers, eyes still closed, not quite ready to look at her.

"No," he said emphatically, "all my fault."

And he finally opened his eyes. She was staring at him. Her eyes blurred together this close up. He removed his hand from her back and brushed his fingers across her cheek as he blinked. It occurred to him that he'd never had to stop doing anything before, never because he was worried about going too far. Or, at least, he couldn't recall a time when he had. And definitely not while snogging. Not that he had an awful lot of experience, but he had been nearly molested by the only girlfriend he'd ever had. And he'd never pushed her away to stop her... well, that wasn't true at all. But he'd never done it because he couldn't trust himself, couldn't stop once he'd been completely submerged. Well, and that explained it, didn't it... he'd never been this far into anything with Lavender...

Anything? What was this, what they were doing?

He grinned as his breathing resumed something close to a normal pace. He didn't care what it was called. It was amazing, no matter what the label said.

Hermione yawned, but tried to stifle it. Ron chuckled and covered her mouth for her with his own large hand as she lost her battle against the yawn. When he removed his hand, she was grinning shyly at him.

"Tired you out?" he asked, his skin burning everywhere.

She pinched his back, unexpectedly, and he squirmed away from her hand... which meant he was simply moving even closer to her, touching her everywhere. Her eyes widened before settling darkly, lips parting again as she flattened her palm to his back.

"Ron..." she began slowly as he moved slightly against her in an effort to resume a less intimate position... not that he minded being where he had inadvertently ended up, but he was once again struck with how easy it would be for him to go _way _too far.

"Hm?" he finally said, by way of reply.

She breathed at him for a long time. Too long. Uncomfortably long, so he began to wonder, almost cripplingly, what she was thinking. And then, she closed her eyes tightly, and bit her lip.

"I probably want a lot more than I should."

"What?" he asked, mouth completely dry. But his mind had been on one thing, and he was clearly misunderstanding her meaning because of his own line of thinking. Well, he wanted a lot more than he should too, but he knew she couldn't mean _she _wanted what _he _did. That was just... absurd.

Her eyes popped open and she stared at him very seriously.

"Can we... go outside?"

"Outside?" he repeated, dumbfounded.

She answered by continuing to stare at him.

"Okay," he finally said, confused.

She pulled away and sat up, sliding down to the end of the bed and standing at the foot. He followed her, walking behind her out of his room, down flights of stairs, to the front door where they slipped their feet into their trainers. He followed her out onto the porch, down into the yard.

The dying sun glowed red on the overgrown plants in the garden, the sky directly overhead already a deep blue, almost navy. He'd been so exhausted before. Yet now, he was overwhelmingly curious... to the point of fear, in fact. Why the hell had she brought him out here?

When they reached the middle of the yard, she whipped around so quickly, he stepped back from her, startled.

"I'm a terrible person," she said immediately, eyes wide.

"Wha-"

"I didn't want you to stop kissing me!"

He blinked down at her, frozen with furrowed eyebrows.

"Why does that make you terrible?" he asked, unable to even focus on the fact that she hadn't wanted to stop kissing him! He was much too wrapped up in the bit about how this made her somehow _less _than perfect in her own eyes...

"Because! _You _wanted to stop!"

"Hermione," he began instantly, "you clearly misunderstood why I needed to-"

"No!" she interrupted. "I didn't misunderstand."

Oh, he wasn't letting her get away with that. If she'd thought he wanted to stop snogging because he'd _wanted _to stop snogging...

"But you did! I _had _to stop, because if I didn't-"

"-you might let it go too far?" she finished, crossing her arms tightly over her chest, eyebrows raised. She had him now. She _had _understood. So what the bloody hell was she on about?

"Right," he said slowly, completely confused now. "So..." He shrugged, totally at a loss.

"I wouldn't have stopped you," she finally explained, looking completely horrified, cringing at her own admission.

He blinked at her for a drawn out moment before glancing around the dark yard, no words coming to mind.

"Say something..." she begged so quietly, nervously hugging her own body and shifting her weight from foot to foot.

"Are you saying..." Ron began, taking a ragged breath to pause and mentally construct the rest of his sentences, "that you wanted to uh... to go further? And I stopped, and so then you felt guilty about it?"

Ron's face burned and he cursed his pale skin as she finally looked up at him.

"I never thought I'd be like this, when I was younger. I thought I had... you know... some self restraint and common sense."

Ron felt a wave of fear course through him as he watched her struggle to continue, hands rubbing up and down her own arms.

"And I thought I'd be too nervous and too scared to get into anything... rash."

Clueless as to where this would lead, Ron stood breathing, watching her, and trying to find hope...

"But with you..."

There was the hope he was looking for.

"It's... different." She paused and looked up at him again, apologies flowing from her large brown eyes. "This is so ridiculous. I'm sorry. I just... I'm afraid to admit the truth... that I'd... do _anything_... you ever wanted to do, whenever you wanted, right _now _if you wanted, because I... I love you. And I want everything. Only with you."

He was stunned absolutely speechless. What was he supposed to say now? His thoughts were a jumbled mess of confused excitement and trepidation at her admissions, only muddled down by the fact that she seemed unhappy to feel the way she did, like she wished she didn't and wanted him to know... for some unexplainable reason.

He wanted to say something, but he couldn't speak. He wasn't sure what would happen if he said the wrong thing, not now when things seemed so delicate, on the edge of a cliff where he could accidentally knock it all over.

"Ron, please say something!" she begged him again, frustrated and glassy eyed as she shifted impatiently, nervously. Terrified.

"I... I..." he tried to begin, but he must have started with the wrong letter because nothing was coming to mind as a follow up. So he shifted to a different approach. "Hermione, bloody hell, you... you _saw _what you were doing to me. I mean, you _know_... you said you know. I love you so much, blimey! What do you want me to think about all this? I mean, what do you need me to do?"

"You really love me?" she asked, eyes wide.

"Well... of course I bloody well love you!"

Her lips curved, higher, higher... until she was actually grinning up at him. He let out something between a relieved sigh and a chuckle, feeling heat rise as he blushed yet again.

"God, so I love _you _and you love _me_. What the hell are we doing standing outside in the middle of the night like this?" he laughed, full grin to go with his bright red cheeks and sparkling eyes.

But as he stood waiting for her to join in his mirth, her grin faded and he felt a lump rise with emphasis to his throat, fear returning as she looked away from him.

"What if I'm rubbish?" she asked, voice near a whisper.

"Rubbish at what?" Ron asked slowly, carefully.

Her eyes met his with a snap and he was caught off guard and off balance, swallowing hard to steady himself.

"You _know_..." she said, gesturing between them. "Ron, I've never done anything like this before!"

"Well, of course you haven't..."

"No! I mean... maybe you know more about this than I do and-"

"I know more about something than you do?" Shit, but he couldn't help himself.

She sighed frustratedly as he recovered from his failed joke, hands shoved deep into his pockets.

"We never really talked about... Lavender," Hermione said slowly.

Well he sure as hell hadn't been expecting Hermione to say something about _her_!

"Wha-"

"I have no idea how I'll be. What if I'm not good enough? I just don't really know what you two... got up to, you know... and I don't want you to think that I'm rubbish compared to her if-"

"Hang on!" Ron interrupted. "You don't _know _what I 'got up to' with Lavender? ! Unless you were blind for all of sixth year, you know exactly..." Wrong direction! He backtracked at record speed... "You think I did something more with her than just snogging?"

Hermione shrugged.

Ron's mouth hung open in complete shock.

Did she really _think_? ! But how _could _she think? !

"You're absolutely mental."

Hermione glared at him through all her embarrassment and insecurity.

"Of course I never... _shagged Lavender_!"

He flinched at his own words. Well, it was just that preposterous!

"Okay, it's definitely time for me to say everything, isn't it?" he said, more to himself than to her. But she looked up at him expectantly, lips parting as she waited. "Yeah. But I should have done this long ago, shouldn't I..."

"Ron... what are you-"

He looked into her eyes and stopped her in her tracks, frozen in their shared gaze as he tried to remember what he'd planned to say, all those words that he'd rehearsed and tried to place correctly into each of his sentences. It was rubbish, it seemed, and no use to him now. And she needed him to start talking, immediately, or he'd leave her out in the cold...

Thunder cracked somewhere distant. His cue, perhaps. And he took a breath, parted his lips, and began at the first place that came to mind...

"I've been in love with you for ages, before I was even _with _Lavender, though I'm pretty sure you'd never have gotten me to admit to it back then..."

Her raised eyebrows confirmed this fact and he paused to nod briefly.

"When you kissed me, in the Room of Requirement, I couldn't exactly deny anymore that you had some feelings for me too."

Obvious, but it deserved stating. And she looked quite spellbound now, hanging on every syllable.

He took another long breath.

"For a long time before that," he continued, "when I thought you _might _but had no way to know for sure, I tried to go over everything I'd ever done to figure out if I'd done anything to deserve a chance with you, what I could have done so right. And then, _when _you kissed me, I tried to understand what I _must _have done to get so lucky... to have everything I ever wanted. But I've stopped trying to figure that out because I know I never will."

Her eyes shone in what little moonlight there was now, dark clouds filling in the night sky with purpose.

"When you mentioned, back there... what you said about... Hermione, just the _thought _of what we were talking about... You're the most beautiful, brilliant, amazing... perfect person, and not just for me. You would be for anyone. And somehow, I won a bloody jackpot..."

And now the sky let loose its first wave of light, cold, misty water... falling on them, between them...

But he was nearly through. Almost to the end. Just one more minute...

"So when you said you thought you wouldn't be good enough... Hermione, there's no one in the whole bloody world who could ever come close to you. I'm the one who's not good enough, no where near. But yet you... _picked _me. So I'm telling you...

His shirt was getting wetter by the second, fringe in his eyes. Her arms clenched tighter against the cold.

"I guess I'm _asking _you...

He stepped closer. He had no dry clothes to offer her, just his hand and perhaps even the pull of his long legs to propel them into the house, out of the rain. Two more words...

"Teach me."

Her jaw dropped slightly and her eyes darted between his.

"Teach you? !"

He nodded.

His smile mirrored hers as their eyes locked again. And he _did _take her hand. And he pulled her towards the house. And he was able to find a few dry spots on his clothing as they reached the porch, timed perfectly with another thunder crack and the distant glow of flashing lightning.

"Yes!" she shouted.

Her grin was infectious.

And he pulled her backwards through the door, into the house...

…ready to start..


	2. Lesson One

_**A/N:** For **urbanmama1**, I wanted to get this posted before you skip town, and here it is! Whew! Can't believe I managed it :D I really hope you enjoy this chapter, as I hope everyone else does too! xx_

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**Chapter Two - Lesson One**

She held his hand until they reached his bedroom, suddenly leading _him _and pausing just inside the door to glance shyly back at him. He smiled, and she relaxed under his gaze as he ran a hand through his hair and closed the door behind them.

He swallowed as she shuffled her feet against his rug. It had been much easier to think about what came next when they'd been standing out in the open, with the sounds of the approaching storm to drown out the rapid beating of his heart. But now, they were here, in his room, utterly alone. And he knew so many things now, things he'd only allowed to rise to the surface as _fantasies _during his most quiet moments, the days before Harry would arrive for the summer... visions of Hermione's lips on his neck and other places that made him blush to recall...

"So..." he said, and he nearly laughed at how predictable it was, that little word you said when you had to break the tension... or die trying.

"So..." Hermione echoed, and it was the repetition that tugged the corners of his mouth up into a grin.

"You've gotta tell me what to do, or I'll just keep standing here," he said, the corners of his eyes creased with the intensity of his nervous smile.

Hermione rolled her eyes, and he bit his lip as tension melted away into familiarity.

"Ron, teachers always make you try on your own as well..."

He took a step in her direction. And she only just suppressed a gasp, leaving him wondering what kind of power he really had over her...

It became instantly impossible to move any closer, as if his feet were suddenly made of lead. So he extended a hand in her direction, waiting with his heart in his throat for her to take it. And she did. He tugged, and she stepped slowly closer, until she was nearly beneath him, his downward-tilted head acting as the eaves under which she took shelter.

Her eyes locked onto his, and he switched his intake of breath from nose to mouth, shallow puffs of air fluttering against the frizziest parts of her hair, framing her face. Letters strung themselves together in meaningless patterns, and he could do nothing but kiss her, knowing that anything he could say would spew from his lips as complete gibberish.

So he bent his neck, lifted a hand to the back of _her _neck, and crushed her lips against his slightly opened mouth. Her bottom lip slipped easily between his, and his knees bent, slack from shock as her body collided with his, torsos sealed together as his fingers curled around the back of her head. He allowed his shy tongue to trail hotly from right to left across her lip, feeling her body tremble against his as she moaned softly. He felt the vibration of her gentle urgency as she moaned again when his tongue moved away, up on her tiptoes now to gain better access. And he tried to catalogue the sounds she was making, the first as pleasure and the second as frustration. So she liked what he was doing before...

He shivered from sternum to toes, sliding his free arm around her waist to hook against the inward curve of her lower back. _How _did they fit so well together? Even her feet, now sliding on top of his, felt exactly right. But he had to be at least a foot taller than her. And his ribs were probably too jagged against her collarbone.

But yet... it was perfect.

He had only one experience to compare this one to, but he found that he couldn't exactly pull up the memories with Lavender properly, like Hermione's proximity acted as an eraser, distancing him even more from the things he'd tried not to think much about anymore anyway. He laughed into her mouth, cut immediately short when her tongue brushed up against his top lip. He groaned against her and opened his mouth to her, actually jolting against her with shock as her tongue met his. He'd only felt this intimacy with her one time before, a few minutes ago, in his bed. But this felt entirely different now, after their conversation outside. His head spun as he fully accepted the fact that he'd admitted to loving her. That she'd said it back...

…and her hand slipped under his shirt, palm flat against his skin.

He separated from her kiss, dragging her lip back for a moment as she resisted, shaking his head and sighing out a ragged breath against her nose.

"If it's already this good," he half-laughed, half-whispered, "then what happens later?"

She reached back to remove his hand from her head, sliding his palm around until she was pressing it to her own cheek. Her eyes drifted shut as she smiled contentedly.

"I don't know..." she said, "but it's going to be nice to find out." And then she opened her eyes, bit her lip, and he couldn't take another moment of their separation.

He crushed her body up against his, lifting her feet off the ground as he kissed her again. She squealed as her arms shot around him to steady her body, and he leaned back, arching his back to hold her weight against his chest. Their tongues met, his knees weakened, and he was sure he'd have to learn how to do this differently, if he hoped to survive his life with her...

Her fingers trailed up his spine to cut through the hairs at the nape of his neck, and he had had enough of remaining upright. He moved his head back, disconnecting his lips from hers again, and he registered a moment of frustration pass across her face before he grinned and tipped them sideways, on top of his bed. She squealed again, covering her mouth as she realized how loud she'd been, and he rolled against her, dragging her up to his pillow and half-covering her body as she reached down awkwardly. He furrowed his brow as her right hand slid down his side, around towards his back, and lower still.

"Hermione, what-" he began, but then her hand was halfway into his back pocket and he froze.

"I'm looking for your wand," she whispered, and as he sucked in a breath, he saw how flushed her cheeks had gotten in the past few seconds, and how shifty her eyes were.

"Other pocket..." he managed to whisper back, and she smiled shyly as she shifted underneath him to reach her _left _hand down his side now.

"I knew it was in your right. I'm just backwards... under you like this..." and as she found his wand and slipped it out of his pocket, he made futile, but desperate, attempts to stop physically reacting to every sodding thing she was doing and saying.

But now she was holding his wand, and bloody hell, he was far too turned on by something so innocent. She casually flicked it before twisting to set his wand on his bedside table. When she settled on her back again, he blinked at her, purposefully distracting himself with curiosity as he pondered what she could possibly have just done. She was too damn good at nonverbals now.

"What-" he began, but she grinned as she read his mind.

"Silencing charm, just in case, so we don't wake anyone..."

"Oh..." he mouthed, swallowing hard as all of the possible implications of needing a silencing charm nagged his brain, forcing him to forget most other things.

He moved his left hand, simply to get more comfortable. But his fingers caught the hem of Hermione's shirt and tugged it up, completely by accident... and his skin was against hers as his head dropped a few inches. And he couldn't move away, skin somehow magically glued to hers.

But he watched her eyes sparkle with some half-formed idea, clouded, no doubt, by their shared passion of moments ago...and when she opened her mouth, he held his breath.

"You should... do more of that..." she said, eyes flicking down in the vague direction of his left hand, still attached hopelessly to that tiny patch of exposed skin just above the hem of her pyjamas.

He rolled off of her, pressing his hand even tighter to her as he rebalanced on his side, facing her. And had he seen a flash of fear cross her face, or perhaps disappointment? She had no idea how much he wanted to touch every inch of her, did she?

Well. She probably did.

He grinned as she turned her head in his direction, fluffy curls spread far across his pillow.

"Okay, just tell me to stop if you don't like it..." he said through his grin, conflicting feelings in the fact that he'd never been so nervous and yet, he couldn't stop grinning proudly at her. Like he'd watched every moment leading up to this one, the height of her perfection.

But now, he had an idea.

With a timid palm, he lifted her shirt, revealing her belly button, stomach sinking and rising with her unsteady breathing. Her ribs came next, peeking one by one out from under thin cotton. And then, he stopped. And he lifted his hand up away from her skin, until only the tips of his fingers remained touching her. She shut her eyes, cheeks so flushed and soft...

And he moved his fingers, like feather tips against silk. She breathed out, muscles tightening before relaxing completely, as if turned instantly, and by his simple touch, to liquid.

He moved his fingers again, all the way to the edge of her torso, left until they curved down along her side. She moaned somewhere distant, as if lost in a dream. And he moved his hand again, back the way it had come.

"Oh, God... Ron, that feels amazing..." she said, writhing slightly beneath his hand as he moved his fingers again.

"Really?" he whispered, stunned and mesmerized to see tiny ripples of goose bumps along her skin in the wake of his fingers.

But in lieu of verbal confirmation, she reached across to take his hand, lifting it from her stomach to her lips. She opened her eyes, kissed the tips of his fingers, and let him go. He couldn't move or breathe, until her fingertips brushed across his own lips. He kissed her automatically, her index and middle fingers imprinting his tingling mouth. And he somehow knew exactly what she wanted him to do next. He dropped his head without pause for thought, and he pressed his lips to her belly button, as soft as he thought possible.

She gasped, arching her back to press her stomach further up against him. And in the midst of adrenaline-induced bravery, he managed to press his tongue to her skin, dragging it along the flat, smooth plane of her stomach, up until his nose tangled against her bunched-up shirt. He found himself nearly on top of her again, only making the realization when he felt his heart beating against her hipbone.

She tasted absolutely flawless. And that was really the only way he knew to explain it. It was as if he was tasting the pure essence that embodied her, stretching across her heart and soul to engulf everything he loved.

Her hands were on his back, and then somehow against his skin... and he pulled away to widen his eyes in her direction as she bunched his shirt up under his arms, lust flooding her eyes. And he tried to believe what he was seeing, though it was difficult, having the knowledge he did of his own appearance, narrow waist beneath reflectively white skin...

He nearly asked if she knew what she was doing, if this was what she really wanted, but he bit his tongue, remembering her speech and anticipating another annoyed eye roll if he dared to question her now. He smiled down to his toes and let her work pointlessly with his shirt, attempting to somehow get it off of him without moving his arms. But he finally took pity on her and rolled off of her to bend an arm behind his head, yanking from the back of his shirt, until he reemerged, bare-chested. He shook his hair out of his eyes as he dropped his shirt off the edge of the bed.

Hermione was propped up on her elbows, her shirt still bunched at her chest. Her eyes roamed, taking in the sight of his naked torso with greed.

"H-Hermione?" he whispered, as if calling out tentatively to a sleeping friend, not wanting to wake them, but needing to reach towards them, in some way, so he wouldn't be alone.

But then her fingertips were against his chin, the lightest touch he'd ever felt, and she moved them down, along the curve of his neck. He instinctively tilted his head back to allow her better access as his toes curled with pleasure. He rolled fully onto his side as she rolled onto her own, to face him, and her hand wandered lower, across bone and light ginger hairs, straight down until she stopped, halfway down his stomach. He forcefully held a deep breath as her index finger drew a circle around his belly button, and then again, increasing in circumference with each pass.

He swallowed a moan as her fingers explored lower still, stopping as she bit her lip, just at the top of his jeans. Right there.

"Feels good, doesn't it?" she asked, and as he searched for her eyes, he found them locked onto her own hand, still paused, immovable, a mere centimetre north of the top button of his jeans.

Was she as nervous as her shy inquiry suggested?

"Absolutely..." was all he could manage through the tightened muscles of his jaw, clenched unknowingly until now, in an effort to keep everything still, quiet, and under control. She was so close to finding out how much he wanted her...

But she lifted her hand, rested her head against his pillow, and found his eyes in the dark. He found strength in her gaze, though he thought it ironic. The one person who could render him speechless also gave him the strength to speak.

"Before," he whispered, licking his suddenly dry lips, "I wanted to... touch every part of your skin." He blushed, but he didn't need to stop. Her eyes grew with wonder as he found her hand with his own, playing absentmindedly with her fingers. "It's so..."

He searched for the word as she waited. But he couldn't find it.

"What do you want me to do?" he asked earnestly, and he knew she could sense the quiet desperation hidden beneath his calm words.

She pushed away from the pillow and sat, and he watched her chest rise and fall deeply as she took a heavy breath, preparing herself... to remove her shirt completely, swiftly, dropping it to join his own on the floor, out of sight. She stared down at him, heaving each breath as she waited for him to approve.

He rolled fully onto his back, wide eyes on her worried lips.

"Y-You haven't answered my question," he whispered, and she began to laugh, a low rumble at first, but soon full and broad, teeth showing as she sank down on top of him, gasping through excitement as the skin of her stomach laid flat against his.

"You could kiss me, if you like," she grinned, and he mirrored her lips with his own before merging them once more into one.

It wasn't long this time until he found himself once again pinning her to the bed, and her leg wrapped around his like it was perfectly natural and normal, a gesture so automatic that it briefly stopped his heart.

He slid his lips away from her mouth, across her jaw, and down her neck. When she pressed her head deeper into the pillow, he knew he was doing the right thing. Was she showing him now, or had he completely taken over? It seemed unimportant to note who was teaching whom... and when he reached her collarbone, the noises she made caused him to forget all about keeping anything secret. His hips pressed firmly against hers, sliding lower to mold easily down along the curve of her thigh and knee. And then she did something entirely unpredictable… she bent her knee up between his legs, just as his lips cleared that first noticeable outward curve of her breasts. His head dropped more firmly against her, tongue blazing along her skin towards the top edge of her bra, and when he felt lace, he also felt her hand tighten in his hair, alerting him to the fact that he couldn't possibly take _enough _notes. He'd not even noticed her hands moving against him until her nails dug painfully into his scalp.

He made a meaningful sound of appreciation as she gasped, his tongue now making its way across the top of her bra, left to right. But as he dropped his head another inch and caught sight of that perfect swell, shockingly hardened tips beneath cotton, he shuddered against her and squeezed his eyes shut.

He felt sure that he wasn't supposed to complete the course in one lesson...

They breathed together, unchoreographed chaos, and finally, he felt her words before he truly heard them, tickling the top of his head.

"Your turn."

He swallowed, lifted his head, and blinked down at her. She nodded, and he was on his back before he could think straight. Her leg moved with him, but she sighed with irritation as her pyjamas twisted, and he watched her take note of his jeans, just as twisted now against his own legs.

Another bite of her own swollen lip, and he wondered if she could possibly be thinking what he was thinking...

But as he considered the likeliness of this prospect, she pressed her whole body to the side of his, and he gasped loudly, embarrassingly, at the renewed close contact. Her flushed cheeks puffed up as she grinned, and he shrugged with a lopsided smile, unable to hide under her careful scrutiny.

And then, her lips were sucking and biting at his right shoulder. And the world turned faster.

She wasted no time there, pausing only briefly to taste his collarbone, before dropping lower. He would have never known how nervous she was... if he hadn't been able to feel it reverberating through her bones, tiny shivers against his highly responsive skin.

And then, she did something he'd not thought she'd be bold enough to do. Her tongue flicked down first, and his whole body seized...

"Fuck..." he breathed, before he could stop himself.

But she must have known, from his lack of restraint, just how lost he was in every sensation, because she lowered her whole mouth, open and hot, against his nipple.

"Oh my God..." he sighed. He'd never, _ever_, known it could feel like this. "This... isn't... fair..." he choked out between her gentle nibbles, her hand now shaking its way across in the wake of her kisses, over his goose bump infested shoulder.

She finally lifted her head an inch from his body, and he found himself aching for the moment of her return. But then he could see how much he'd unraveled her, and he tried to focus.

"Was that okay?" she whispered, so small and light.

"Yeah! Bloody hell..." Sod it. He couldn't have held back his enthusiasm now if he tried. And he _wasn't_trying...

She giggled - actually _giggled _- and he grinned lovingly down at her as she looked up at him, her cheeks positively burning. His fingers ran airily down her spine, and she melted again beneath his touch.

"When I was really small," she said slowly, "Mum used to draw letters on my back with her fingers and I'd guess the message. Calmed me down when I had to get to sleep."

His smile softened as she closed her eyes.

"Well, flip over then, and I'll do you," he said, roots of his hair even trying to blush as he realized his extremely poor phrasing. But Hermione laughed and turned away from him, looking back over her shoulder at the last second to lift her eyes to his... and subsequently stop his heart in its tracks, yet again.

She bent her knees to relax as he rolled to his right side to face her mostly-naked back, leaving just enough space between them to reach a hand up to brush the length of her hair over her shoulder.

"Okay," he said, trying hard to be clever with his choice of secret message, but failing to manage it in such a state...

He touched the tip of his index finger to her warm skin, but he was distracted momentarily by the possibility of staring without her cross-examination. Finally, as if waking from a daydream, he remembered his task, and trailed his finger as softly as possible along her skin, listening for the telltale signs of her enjoyment, signs he'd learned so very much about in just one night...

He completed the 'I' and paused to let her consider it. And, exhaling contentedly, he began the 'G'. After the 'O', she shuffled against the mattress.

"I, G, O?" she questioned, and he could have almost bet she was wrinkling her nose in confusion as she tried to uncover his plan.

"You'll get it," he reassured her, and she settled again for the 'T'.

"Oh," she sighed, and he smiled as he breathed in the wonderful scent of her hair, nearly inhaling a few stray pieces as he lost his depth perception.

'Y', 'O', and then she shuffled again.

"Ron, what-"

But he added the 'U', and slid bravely closer to her as he dropped his hand.

"I got..." she paused, then laughed.

"'I love you' was too-" but he interrupted himself with a yawn... "-obvious."  
Still laughing, she reached back and took his hand, drawing it over her body to rest against her stomach. He swallowed hard as his body seemed to move on its own ever closer to her, until the parts that weren't touching - along the zip of his trousers, the inward curves of his thighs - burned almost unbearably with the distance.

A distance of mere centimetres, yet endless miles.

"How did I do, on my first lesson?" he whispered into her hair, closing his eyes.

"You'll get an O for sure," she whispered back, and the last thing he remembered, before dreaming of her, was the feeling of her spine, pressing back more tightly, comfortingly, against his chest.


End file.
